The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) will issue a policy proposal Aug. 4 to rescind the Biden administration’s controversial approval of taxpayer-funded abortion coverage as part of military benefits and abortions at military hospitals.
The VA “is proposing to reinstate the full exclusion on abortions and abortion counseling from the medical benefits package, which was removed in 2022,” states an unpublished proposed rule scheduled to appear on the Federal Register on Aug. 4. The proposal was approved by VA Secretary Douglas Collins July 24.
Before the Biden administration’s rule change, the new proposal explains, the exclusion of abortion and abortion-related services “had been firmly in place since the medical benefits package was first established in 1999.”
The proposal also moves to “reinstate the exclusions on abortion and abortion counseling for Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Department of Veterans Affairs (CHAMPVA) that were removed in 2022. We take this action to ensure that VA provides only needed medical services to our nation’s heroes and their families.”
A statement from Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America celebrated the move as a “MAJOR WIN” for the pro-life movement.
The organization condemned the approval that the Biden administration had granted to cover abortions in the military as “flouting longstanding federal law and intentionally violating state pro-life laws.”
“The policy was so extreme that videos obtained from the Department of Veterans Affairs showed staff being trained to push statutorily prohibited abortion as the safest ‘option’ for veterans,” the group added. “This marks yet another major pro-life victory under President Trump’s leadership, building on a series of decisive actions, including the recent passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act which stopped forced taxpayer funding of Big Abortion.”
Pro-life leaders and organizations, including CatholicVote, have vehemently opposed the Biden administration’s rule change since it was first enacted shortly after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, finding that there is no constitutional right to abortion.
On the day of that ruling, President Joe Biden pledged an “all-of-government” effort to promote abortion.
President Donald Trump largely reversed that effort when he began his second term in January. He signed an executive order directing all taxpayer funding of abortion to cease. By the end of his first two weeks back in office, the Pentagon had reversed the Biden administration’s approval of taxpayer-funded “abortion travel” for military personnel and their families.
Readers can find the full text of the Trump administration proposal to end abortion here.